In Douglas Campbell's sermon, he explores the concept of prayer as a crucial means of grace, alongside the scriptures, for fostering holiness and spiritual maturity. He cautions against legalism and antinomianism, urging believers not to treat spiritual disciplines as mere checkboxes for earning God's favor. Instead, he emphasizes that these disciplines are gifts from God to help believers grow in their relationship with Him. Campbell draws from Mark 1:35-39, highlighting Jesus' example of early morning prayer in solitude, to illustrate the necessity of undistracted and sincere communion with God. He underscores prayer as a transformative practice that allows believers to express their deepest desires and anxieties, ultimately changing the believer rather than God. The sermon calls for a life committed to prayer, urging believers to overcome pride and self-sufficiency, recognizing their dependence on God for everything.

Well this morning if you would turn with me to Mark chapter 1, I'm going to look specifically again this is more topical than it is expositional as we go through four of the major means of grace. Specifically this morning I want to look at verse 35, but let's for some context let's read Mark chapter 1 verses 35 through 39. The Word of God says, "...and rising very very early in the morning while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place. And there he prayed. And Simon and those who were with him, searched for him.

And they found him and said to him, Everyone is looking for you. And he said to them, Let us go into the next towns, that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out. And he went out through all Galilee preaching in their synagogues and casting out demons." Let's pray again. Father, thank you again for your word. Thank you, Father, that While no man may look directly into your face and live, Father, you reveal yourself to us.

We peer at you, Father, though through a dim mirror. Father, we can have a glimpse of you, that we can come to know you, Father. Father, thank you for your word that we might know you. Thank you for your word that we might know how to know you more. Thank you for your grace, your gifts to us, both by your word and through our prayers that you hear our prayers.

Father, thank you this morning. I pray that you would draw us near, you would give us understanding, and that God, it would be all to your glory. In Christ's name, amen. Amen. Well, last week we went fairly deeply into the means of grace before we started to look at the first means of grace, that was specifically the Scriptures.

And as we talked about the means of grace, we're reminded, though our legalist self would look at these things, I don't know how to title it correctly, but we would look at religious things and we in some form of piety would place upon ourselves a yoke of trying to be obedient to do whatever it is we think we need to do to appease God. But again, that is legalism. Yet so often we slip into that position. It's ever drawing us, it's ever pulling us. We must pray that God would keep us from this ditch.

It's as if we are driving down a gravel road in the middle of winter, and we continue to slide one direction or another, and we begin to realize that we need God to keep us on the road. Now I know some of you are amazing drivers. But in this ditch between legalism and anti-nominism, the idea that I don't have to do anything, I just believe in God and I do whatever I want. The ditch for both sides of this, legalism versus antinomianism, is very close. And so often we're being drug one way or the other.

And as we come to the means of grace, it's so important that we understand this, that we don't read the Word of God every day to gain some sort of standing with God, or to, as we say over and over, to check the religious box. Now I have, so often, and I tend to be, the older I get, the more I tend to be switching back to all the things that I, All the good things that I used to do. I used to have a reading plan that I kept in my Bible and every day As soon as I was done reading I would check the box and that sounds silly at this point, but that's not all that bad but if By for some reason I have convinced myself that by checking that box every day, that I am the good and proper Christian and God should be proud of me, I am a legalist and I have many problems. As we come to look at the means of grace, we have to understand rightly what they are. They are a means to our holiness.

They are a means that God normally, ordinarily uses to make us more like him. But we have to remind ourselves over and over what does the word grace mean? It's we are getting what we don't deserve. That this isn't a daily checkbox, but this is a daily gift to me. And in reality that's the difference between legalism and doing what's right.

In legalism, my reading this is my gift to God, but in biblical Christianity, my reading this is God's gift to me And it's that is why I come to it day after day after day after day because this is God's gift I Get to know him I get to know who he is. I don't have to walk in darkness, as we talked about on Wednesday a little bit. I don't have to stub my toes and fall in the woods at night and stab myself. Have you ever walked through the woods and when it's not all that light out and a tree branch get you right in the eye? If you spent much time in the woods, that's probably happened to you.

That is not the funnest experience you will have that day. Yet without the Word of God, that's precisely what you and I would be doing in the spiritual. But by God's grace, by unmerited gifts, He sheds light to our path. So the first means of grace, the first gift that we looked at was God's Word. It was the Scriptures that we don't have to walk around blindly.

We don't have to walk around as the world, the world that parts themselves from the scripture if they are still spiritual This is what they will do they will walk around in darkness and they will say but I feel like this is how God is and I feel like this is The way God is and everything is all based upon their feelings. And if you need any logic to deliver you from this way of thinking, if what you feel about God is true, and what I feel about God is true, and if they conflict, they can't be true. So you will notice, for instance, to take a little bit of a side road, how many books are there on the market about, or how many TV preachers are there that claim that God has taken them to heaven, and all of a sudden they've got to write a book about it. And if you've read any amount more than one of these books, one thing that should scream out to you and alarm to you right up in front. It should be that, why don't these two people agree?

Why isn't heaven the same for both of them? Isn't it the same place? Maybe this has less to do with truth and it has more to do with selling books. Amen? Because if it's true, it's the same.

If I went, If Elveston continued to grow at a substantial rate, and all of a sudden they put a four-way stop maybe in the middle of Elveston. And the stoplight is red on all four sides, just like in Hamilton on Broadway. And you came in here and I said, what color is that light that's flashing? And Jake said, it's red. And Kenny Jr.

Says, no, that's not red. That's purple. Now, what color is it? Is it both? It can't be both.

I guess, yeah, with LEDs probably can be, but is the one in Hamilton both? It's only one. Left to your feelings, you are left with false ideas that you deceive yourself into comforting yourself and making God be what you want. And what is it called when we make God to be what we want? It is called idolatry and it's one of the oldest sins in the book.

Without this, you are all idolaters. Are you hearing me? The world says this is just truth for you. My truth is different and they're absolutely wrong. This is truth for everyone and anything a part of it is idolatry and is a commandment of God not to do that.

The Scriptures are an amazing gift. Apart from them, we wouldn't know God at all. This morning, continuing on, the next gift that I'd like to look at is the gift of prayer. Reminding you again that these gifts are designed to make you more holy. These gifts are the ordinary way that God matures you in Christ.

If you don't read the Scripture, you will not become a mature Christian. The same way as if you were a young child and you didn't eat anymore. You would never grow up. You'd spend much time at the hospital, them trying to figure out what is wrong with you. And at some point it will be shown to all of us what really was going on is that you were on a path to death.

If you don't read the scriptures, you will not grow. It's just the way it is. Secondly, on to prayer. So what is prayer? John Calvin, I believe, has defined it probably better than anywhere else that I've ever read.

He said, in prayer we both communicate and commune with our Father in heaven, feeling our transparency in His presence. Like Christ in Gethsemane, we cast our desires, sighs, anxieties, fears, hopes, and joys into the lap of God. Hear that again. In prayer we both communicate and commune with our Father in heaven. It's not just a list of once.

It's not just that we come before Him and we say, well, here's all of my problems. Let me list through them before I go to bed. It's actually communion with God. Today, as we go to communion, we are communing with each other, but we're remembering Christ. It's that we are sharing a time together as we remember our Savior, remember what He has done.

It's more than saying hi. In fact, it's one of the most serious times within the church because we are warned by the Apostle Paul that if we take of communion wrongly, it's that we are we are taking judgment upon ourselves. He said that as we read, often times, he said, that's why many of you are sick and some of you are even dying. Why? Because you went to the Lord's table wrongly.

Now the question is, do you commune with God? Is there that interaction? Is there that time spent with Him? Or is it like the Disney movies where you rub on the lamp and the guy comes out and you tell him your three wishes and then you move on? God is not a genie in a lamp.

Last night I spoke with my kids about priorities. I said, you know, we oftentimes say we have priorities and this specifically had to do with work. And I believe, I believe that entertainment is okay within reason, right, within, can't think of the word for it. But entertainment and fun things are the reward of getting your work done. They don't come before getting your work done.

And oftentimes people would say, well, you know, I do value this, I do value that, and yet their actions say something completely different and really this has Just this is the what you do as a father when you raise children you say yes You say that this is important you say that your animals drinking is important but if you begin to play a board game before that's done, you communicate that this has a higher priority. Not with your mouth, but with your actions. As I said, what speaks louder, actions or words? Obviously, it's actions. So what are your actions towards God?

Many of us would say prayer is important, but what our actions say that? Many of us say communion with God would be important, but do our actions display it? Understand here, as John Calvin lays out a definition of it before us, that it's even more than just our wants. It's laying out before God what I'm thinking. What's going on in my world?

He already knows it. You know, oftentimes people think, well, I can never tell God what I'm really thinking, or he wouldn't be happy with me. He already knows it. Just be honest with him and tell him. Tell him your desires.

Tell him your sighs, your anxieties, your fears, and your hopes, and your joys. Not just your wants. Now what is the gift of prayer? One of the greatest gifts of prayer for my brothers and sisters is that he hears the prayers of the saints. That is His grace.

He gives you what you don't deserve. Hear me this morning. Understand yourself rightly. Understand your flesh. You don't deserve God to hear you, and I don't deserve God to hear me.

I have been an enemy of His through wicked works. I've been an enemy of His, only treating Him as if He's the guy that I go to if I need something. I don't deserve His ear. Yet the Word of God says he hears the prayers of the saints. In 1 John 5 14 it says, and this is the confidence that we have towards him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.

Don't lose how important this is. And I think I shared this a couple of weeks ago, but Havodhi Bakkam has many great sermons, and in this sermon He talks specifically about this verse and some others. And he says, you know, the Christian, oftentimes what he hears is they'll say, well, I prayed for this and I prayed for that and God just hasn't answered my prayers. And only the way Bodhi can say it, he says, you need to check yourself. Because the Bible says God did hear your prayer.

And the reason you think that he didn't, the reason you think that he's not answering, is because he's not answering it the way you think he should. Brothers and sisters, God hears your prayers if you're in Christ. It is an amazing treasure. The world can't say the same. I see so often, and I hurt with people, and I hear of things that go on and terrible wrecks, even last night, terrible wreck in Hamilton.

And I see people all over social media saying, we need to pray for these people. And there's something that's a blessing about that. But then on the other side of it is heartbreaking. Because it's very likely for the most of those people who are praying, it is an abomination to God because they don't know Him. He's simply the guy they go to if somebody needs something or somebody's in a car wreck.

C.S. Lewis reminds us, He says, I pray because I can't help myself. I pray because I'm helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the time, waking and sleeping. It doesn't change God, it changes me.

The second grace of prayer is that prayer changes us. I have been through some things that I've seen a doctor in the last month or so and through some direction that this doctor has given me, I've been looking at different things that, different directions that could help me sleep and different things like this. And one of those things that I've been suggested is that I should start journaling. And I've seen people journal. I don't think it's a bad thing.

But for me, if I want to learn how to do something, What does one do when they want to learn how to do something? What do you think Sam? They go get a book, right? Right. So I've been reading this modern book on journaling so I can understand it and how to do it if I'm going to do it.

The title of the book is Your Head is a Houseboat, written by Campbell Walker. And one of the things that stood out in it, and obviously I'm not the guy that reads you secular books, but I want you to see something. It says, if you don't have hands or perhaps you just hate writing, then you can achieve similar results to journaling by speaking and recording every thought. The key thing is that these thoughts are captured somewhere external to your head. Now that sounds really cool, but you know I read this line in the book and all of a sudden I started to understand my problem.

The world understands this benefit. The world understands the idea of there's so much going on in your head, you need to put it somewhere else, and they find benefit in it. But as I read this, I believe that God has checked me. Do you know what this says to me? You don't pray enough.

This is precisely what prayer does. And I'm not saying if you journal, go to journal. That's a great thing. But don't do it at the neglect of prayer. God has already understood that we need this.

God has already given us a gift that we could help empty our heads. And what is it? And I come to this often to to the elders and I say I wrestle with all these problems and and God always brings back to you must pray more and more and more and more and more the world doesn't understand that as prayer they They just understand there's a benefit in putting your thoughts somewhere else. But God has given you a gift. You don't even need a journal.

And I shouldn't say silly book because I'm not against journaling, don't take that wrongly. But The journal is just a book. I have the king of the universe listening to my thoughts. The king of the universe who can change my heart, who can help me through things. I have the king of the universe who can decide at any moment that now is the time that you can sleep.

We have something far superior. That's a gift. Are you taking advantage of this gift? Now continuing, Proverbs 28 verse 9 says, if one turns away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer is an abomination. If you are in Christ, God has given you something the rest of the world doesn't have.

That's his ear. Do you appreciate it? Do you take advantage of it? Yesterday somebody gave me a great gift and that gift was a clean van. Now imagine if they cleaned my van I'm just like yeah I'm not gonna use that van anymore.

Alright that's far-fetched analogy. Imagine somebody gave you a great gift and you just never saw value in it. And you'd say, well, I do see value in it, but you just never use it. They buy you a ball glove and it just sits on your table. You say, I'm so thankful to have this ball glove and it's never used.

God has given you a gift. Do you use it? Philippians 4, 6 through 7. And as we go to this, I'd like to remind all the young people, this Wednesday there will be an enhanced candy box for anyone who memorizes these two verses. So Philippians 4, 6 through 7, it says, Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.

And look at the result of this. So again, we're coming back to this idea. We have stress, we have anxiety, we have all these things that living in a fallen world produces within us. And God says, do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your request be made known to God and the result of it and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. What a gift!

What a gift! Amen! Now coming back to the text in Mark 1 verse 35. I think there's some things we can learn from this text. And it's Jesus as he preaches in Galilee in verse 35 it says, And rising very early in the morning when it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed." The first thing that I think we can miss, but it's quite obvious to us, if Jesus Christ, the Son of God, needed to pray before he served God, before he got about his day, then who are you and I to think that we don't need to pray?

He's the perfect Son of God, and yet he still realized and understood his dependence upon the Father. Do you realize this dependence? Do you need to pray? First it says, rising very early in the morning while it's still dark. I think to understand rightly, we need undistracted prayer.

We need to... Some of the best times of my study and some of the best times of my study and some of the best times of my spending time with God is usually in the middle of the night or it's at five in the morning. It's when everyone else is sleeping, when my phone doesn't make a peep, when there's no commotion going on within the house, it's in those times that I can focus, it's those times that I can not be distracted, that I can that I can spend quality time in the Word of God and in prayer. Do you have this kind of time? Jesus was very busy.

In fact, you'll see a little later, he's so busy that disciples are trying to remind them, hey, you got work to do here. Where'd you go? Second, he went out to a desolate place. Again, he got alone. He was away from distraction.

He didn't need people to be around. I'm inspired and I haven't started, but I'm intrigued by the reformers as Martin Luther, whom always prayed out loud. He never prayed quietly in his mind. He prayed out loud because he said that then his mind would be less apt to be distracted by something else, and that he would not honor God and disciplining his mind to stay focused on what it should stay focused on. And oftentimes as I work with people with attention problems, We live in a world that teaches our young people and now it's middle-aged people and probably all of us at this point who have grown up with devices and TVs and all these things.

We have been trained to always need entertainment, to always need change, to always need something else. And it's quite devastating to our prayer life. And so one of the things I ask someone who is struggling to keep attention is, I will say, how long, and I clarify it, I said I struggle with it just as everybody else you know that has a heart beating, they struggle with this. Their pride sometimes don't want to tell you this, but I guarantee you this is a struggle, and the struggle is this. When you begin to pray, how long can you do it and force your mind to stay on prayer?

How long does it take it to get drugs somewhere else? And oftentimes it's going to be very short if you're honest. I said this in part is a result of the world we live in. And I believe that many of us would do well to simply be done with all of these devices that teach us these bad habits. But if not, this muscle has to be exercised.

And there are times where I will have to say, I am going to pray and I'm going to stay on focus for whatever 10, 15, 20 minutes. Start working yourself up. And if I don't reach the 10 minutes, and I usually have it start small, start with five minutes. And if you don't get to the end of the five minutes praying and you're already distracted, you say, okay, let's try it again. And you stay there.

And you keep trying, and you keep trying until you force your brain to obey. Until you beat your flesh in this objection. Adding to that fight though, will be to try to pray in a non-desolate place. Desolate means wilderness or desert. Essentially what it means is this place where there isn't people, there isn't things, there isn't distractions.

Do you have a desolate place? When we first moved to to Carthage, For some reason I was really big on this word and I'm like I just need a desolate place and if you have more if you have One kid or more you'll know that it's important to have times where you have a desolate place that you can pray One of the things that and I'm not trying to take lots of rabbit trails, one of the things that was very hard when I first moved here as a pastor, and it had nothing to do with any of you, but it was that my office was in the same place my house was. Place my house was." And you say, well, what's hard with that? Well, it's very hard to study when you hear your wife correcting one of your kids. Why?

Because the guy in you says, I will take care of this. It's just not desolate. It's very hard. It makes it all the harder. Now my wife does a very good job of displaying our kids, but I have to be her knight in shining armor.

I can't just let her fight battles on her own. Amen? Amen. But you need a desolate place. And maybe for you it's just getting up before the rest of your family.

And men, I would call you, as often I do, specifically, you can't do the things God has called you to do as the man of the house if you don't pray. You can't. You'll always fail. By God's grace you will fail. And you say, what do I mean by that?

Because the moment your pride grows to the point you think you don't need God's help in discipling your family, you are the problem. The same is all ministry. Amen. Martin Luther understood prayer well. He said, I have so much to do that I shall spend the first three hours in prayer.

Martin Luther understood that there was a conversation he had with someone else. I can't remember who that was right offhand, but he told them that today is such an especially busy day that I'm gonna have to spend an extra hour in prayer. In fact, I think Brother Joel Beeke explained it well, that normal people like you and I, we tend to be like the accordion, that when our day gets busy, the part of prayer tends to shrink in. But in fact, as we come to grow in holiness and understand our need for God well, it should actually be the opposite. That the busier our day becomes, our prayer life doesn't suffer, but it actually grows to accommodate those extra things that are in our day.

Now if you're like me, as I ponder that, I realize quite quickly how much I need to repent. Continuing on, we also see this misunderstanding in the disciples in Mark chapter 1 verses 36 through 39. It says, and Simon and those who were with him, and Simon and those who were with him searched for him, and they found him and said to him, everyone is looking for you. And he said to them, let us go to the next town that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out. Why I came out.

And he went through all Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and casting out demons. What was the disciples misunderstanding? They didn't understand their need for the dependence upon God the Father. They make the same mistake that many in ministry make today, where they see all the things that we should be doing. And in fact, the same obviously is true of elders.

We see all the things that need to get done in the church. And for the most part, what normally happens is prayer takes the back burner. And we have this to do and that to do, and we look at the typical American pastor who spends his time doing everything in the church and mowing the yard and doing all these things. And I hit on this often because I want us to see the damage that comes from this. The damage is, is he doesn't spend his time in the Word.

He doesn't spend his time in prayer. And the elder who isn't doing these things will quickly be deceived by the enemy and will lead entire flocks into idolatrous beliefs. But the same is true of you. Whatever your calling is, whether it's to be a mother of children, a father of children, or whether it's to be just a leader to your spouse as a husband, If you don't pray, you will soon find yourself doing all kinds of things that are good things, but it will lead you to destruction, for you've forgotten what is most important. And we're reminded in Acts chapter 4 when the Apostle said, but we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the Word.

In fact, any ministry and anything you do in life, it must be started with the understanding that it has to be rooted in prayer. And as we look at theology and we look at what the Reformers believed, and what seems quite obvious of the Apostles, is that though the elders are to be called to be devoted to prayer and to ministry of the word that even that even within that prayer is primary. And I would tell you whatever you do, prayer is primary. But I would ask you this morning, many of you would agree, you would say, yes, you're right, pastor, prayer is primary, But do your actions say otherwise? Joel Beeke's father was a ruling elder in his church for over 40 years.

And when Joel was fairly young, He already felt called to ministry and was preparing himself and reading books, and his father was discipling him. And he said at 15, his father told him as he was preparing for ministry, he said these words. He said, I want you to remember two things. The greatest problem with nominal church members is worldliness. And secondly, the great problem with the people of God in church is their prayerlessness.

And I believe he is absolutely 100% correct. And I spend much of my time trying to battle worldliness. So much so that some of you are probably tired of hearing about it. You probably think, well this guy is extreme. He's hard-nosed.

I'm trying to rescue you from worldliness. I'm trying to alert you to it, because the enemy is a smooth talker. But secondly, within the church there are those whom—we have to be careful about wording here—but within the gathering of the church, there are also those whom are true believers of God. They are the remnant, and their greatest struggle is prayerlessness. And as I pondered this week, pondered this this week, I thought of all the things that I struggle with, and all the things that break my heart.

And I even think of what Thanksgiving and holidays are like to be in a family that isn't in Christ. And my brothers and I, we pray for each other, and we say glorify Christ in your family gathering. It's going to be hard, but glorify Him. Love those whom blaspheme Christ. Love those whom live in a way that you see them all the time, shooting themselves in the foot.

Love those people. And I like to internally start to analyze and say, and so often I envy the gifts that others have, not appreciating what God has given me. And I envy, I think of times of, you know, what it would be to have, even to marry a wife who had a godly father whom would disciple me and all these things that I would deeply desire. And yet, God has given me more than I deserve. What joy it would be to go to Thanksgiving and and everyone's getting along.

What joy it would be to go to Thanksgiving and not have to be the mediator again. But God has given me more than I deserve. So as I think of all these things, and I think of The world we live in, I think of how things seem to be falling apart and there's ample number of problems I can list as my problems. But hear me this morning, My biggest problem isn't my unsaved family. My biggest problem is prayerlessness.

Because if I prayed for my extended family like I should, God would change my heart. I wouldn't sit here wondering how long is the acceptable time to be here that I could leave and go do something else. I wouldn't sit here thinking about how amazing it would be if I was at one of my church members house right now instead of here. You wouldn't believe it but I think of these things. I'd rather be at your house most of the time.

Me and John play with his fish tank. It'd be so fun. We wouldn't have to fight with anybody. But friends, my biggest problem is prayerlessness. As you examine the problems in your life, if you're in Christ, your biggest problem is prayerlessness.

Why is this true? Why don't we pray? I think we, as we're drawing to an end, in Revelation 3 verse 17, I find these words that are directed towards the church, but we can see them to us. It says, For you say, I am rich. I have prospered and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.

We don't pray because of our pride. We think that we can do this on our own. We don't need God's help. After all, it's me that's going out and working and doing whatever it is that you do for a living. It's me that chooses to pay the bills.

It's me that does this. It's me that does that. And as soon as something happens in our life, typically where it becomes reality that I can't fix this, then all of a sudden we want to pray. But what's our problem? We don't realize that God gave us the strength to work.

We don't realize that He gave us the next breath to work and the next heartbeat to work. We don't realize that He has given us everything. And in fact, everything that we think that we can do on our own, it's nothing but pride and a foolishness that's found within us. We are wretched. We are pitiable.

We are poor. We are blind. And we are naked. And if we would ever come to realize that rightly, we would fall to our knees and we would pray every moment we could. Because God has given us a great gift.

He's given us life. He's given us everything that we have. Who would we be to then turn to him and say, I've got this under control. I don't need you. Finally, Isaiah 64, 6 through 7, it says, We have all become like one who is unclean, And all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment.

We all fade like a leaf, And our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. There is no one who calls upon your name, who rouses himself to take hold of you, for you have hidden your face from us and have made us melt in the hands of our iniquities. Friends, that's where we are as a nation. It seems that God's judgment is upon us, And I pray that God will give us another great awakening. I pray for what we don't deserve, but God is gracious.

Perhaps He would awaken us again, But the sign or the indication that God is awakening us again isn't that we vote in the right politician. The indication that God will spare us, that He will bring us to repentance, the indication is, will His people begin to pray again? And if they won't, His judgment's on us. So friends, we can point out the tour and we can say how terrible it is out there, and it is bad. I've seen far worse in the Bible, and God rescued his people from far worse than this.

Hope isn't over. God is gracious. He is slow to wrath. He is slow to anger. But will He bring you to pray?

I mean really pray. Not just say a few lines before bed about the things we need, but really communion with Him, really pray, really know Him. It's free gifts to his children. He holds them out to you. Will you take them?

Will you commit your life to be a life of prayer? This morning, in two very quick applications, I would tell you we know scripture says to pray always and in a sense we should always pray we should always be God should always be on our minds he should always be what we are thinking of and when good things happen, it's sometimes my prayers like, God, thank you for that. And it's just in my head. And often that's probably a prevalent thing that should go on within us. Just always acknowledging Him, always sharing your day with Him.

But then secondly, that results from an organized and ordinary and routine time of prayer, a time set apart. Maybe it's when you wake up in the morning, maybe it's, maybe it is before you go to bed, but it's not just a list of wants, it's God, let me spend time with you. Let me spend time praying your word. You know, oftentimes we say, pray that God would increase our knowledge because the Bible tells us to pray for that. And if the Bible tells me to pray for something, I'm pretty, it's a good indicator that's, I'm praying His will.

That's a good thing to pray, amen? But you need an organized, established prayer routine that you're spending time in prayer. Amen? God did make us problem solvers, and that's a blessing from Him, but that gift can turn into, we think we're self-sufficient. And if you're spending more time figuring out how you're going to fix all your problems than you are praying to the God who can fix them, you're inordinate, you're out of order.

Men pray, women pray, children pray, is a gift of God purchased by the blood of His Son. Isn't that amazing? Purchased by Christ, not something you deserve, but all those who turn from their sin and trust in Christ for their redemption, God hears you. And if you're not in Christ, you're to be pitied among all men because you're on your own. You want to be self-sufficient?

God will let you be self-sufficient. You'll have no one to turn to. In fact, He'll answer for your sin. Don't push away His gifts. Repent and trust in Christ.

Turn to Him and live. Turn to Him and be heard. Amen. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for your word.

Father, thank you that you hear our prayers. My boy is born with a birth defect. He's taken to the hospital to do surgery. Father, you heard my prayer. Father, thank you most of all when I came to you heartbroken and for once seeing my sin and the truth, seeing it in light, as I cried out to you that you would forgive me, Father, you have heard my prayer.

For God, you changed me. For God, you changed me. Father, for everyone here, I pray that one, we'd be reminded that you hear our prayers. I pray that you would help us to not practice unspoken atheism by never praying to you. I pray that we would be quick to draw near.

I pray that we would taste your glory, that it would consume us, that we might cry out, glory to you alone, Father, for you are good. Father, break us if we need broken, to whatever it takes to bring us to our knees, that we might depend upon you, that we might love you, that we might turn to you at every moment, praying thy will be done. Help us, Father, in Christ's name. Amen. Thank you.